Die Schule der Anatomie

»MacLaverty stellt sich mit diesem Werk zu der ersten Garde der zeitgenössischen irischen Erzähler.«
Renate Dubach, Berner Zeitung, April 2003

»Die Dialoge sind das Besondere des Romans: Sie sind eckig, tasten sich vorsichtig voran und schießen übers Ziel hinaus, wie bei neuen Bekanntschaften, die man noch nicht einzuschätzen weiß und vor denen man sich blamieren könnte. Sie sind schlagfertig, geistreich - ein Kräftemessen wie für eine immerzu ablaufende Humorpfrüfung.«
Sabine Franke, Frankfurter Rundschau - Literatur, März 2003

Tenderly drawn, Bernard MacLaverty has once again produced something of genius. The dialogue exposes choices and the people who face them as well as any stage play. But the interior world of Martin is where the real illumination lies. You see him as clearly as you would yourself. MacLaverty's work travels on with you, long after the book has been closed.
Irish Tatler - August 2001

Bernard MacLaverty's beautifully written portrayal of how a mind changes as it acquires new knowledge is masterful…
Hal Jensen - TLS 7th September 2001

MacLaverty is a master of many moods and this genial, intelligent novel finds him at his relaxed best.
David Robson - The Sunday Telegraph 9th September 2001

The Anatomy School adds up to a celebration of friendship, an exhilarating reconstruction of male adolescence, and an unembittered swipe at rebarbative educational practices. But revenge is not the mainspring of Bernard MacLaverty's literary impulse; what he's engaged in, instead, is a scintillating exercise in re-creation.
Patricia Craig - Independent 8th September 2001

Exceptionally skilled at entering into the lives of the lonely or impaired, he depicts unfulfilment with an authenticity unmatched in Irish fiction since James Joyce's Dubliners… Until now, his books (triumphs of exactness in which time, place and personality are caught with unshowy authority and not a word seems wasted) have tended to be as melancholy as they are masterly. Their humour has had a bleak edge. With The Anatomy School, exuberance breaks through. Zestfully funny scenes intersperse more caustic comedy. Especially entertaining are the novel's visits to the supper evenings where three garrulous Belfast women get together with their parish priest to munch dainty sandwiches and chew over theological niceties… Not the least of the factors making The Anatomy School outstanding even by MacLaverty's standards is that it seems deeply rooted in his own life.
Peter Kemp - The Sunday Times - 26 August 2001

This tender, funny and gripping novel says as much about the state we're in as many a history book. Yet it still manages to entice the reader with its familiar characters and teasing storyline. Like the best of drama, The Anatomy School draws pictures in the imagination, and offers a lesson of the most enjoyable kind. Perhaps one of MacLaverty's best and most exuberant books.
Grania McFadden - Belfast Telegraph - 1st September 2001

In what is possibly the best of MacLaverty's novels, he brings the clearest insight - and wonderful simplicity of structure - to an organic unity; and by vivid presentation of the symbols of emotion, kindles the emotive sympathy of the reader.
Cal McCrystal - The Independent on Sunday - 26 August 2001-09-12

But the marvellous qualities of this long and splendid book are the affection and humour which grace it everywhere.
Isobel Murray - The Herald - 18th August 2001-09-12

This is a brilliant novel about adolescence… the steel core of the novel is the boys' evolving friendship and their relations with treacherous teachers. It's mostly done through dialogue, but the boys also express themselves by jumping, pushing, punching. Reading the book is like watching a movie.
Victoria Glendinning - Daily Telegraph - 25th August 2001

…his book's the best I've read all year…
David Robinson - The Scotsman - 11 August 2001

…a funny and poignant coming of age story…
Anna Burnside - Sunday Herald - 19th August 2001

James Joyce invented the modern novel when he wrote A Portrait of the Artist As A Young Man. J.D.Salinger wrote perhaps the definitive coming-of-age yarn, featuring Holden Caufield in The Catcher in the Rye. Mordecai Richler and Alice Munro gave voice to their own country'scoming of age when they wrote The Apprenticeship Of Duddy Kravitz and Lives of Girls And Women. They gave the tried and true structure fresh life by making it relevant to a particular place and time. Into this tradition comes Bernard MacLaverty's The Anatomy School.
Deborah Dundas - The Toronto Star - 30th September 2001

Annas Lied

»Ein poetischer Roman über Musik und Mutterschaft. Bernard Mac Laverty gelingt das komplexe Porträt einer Frau, die in allererster Linie Künstlerin ist.«  
Kirkus Review

»Bernard Mac Lavertys Roman ist in jeder Hinsicht ein Triumph. Er ist gleichermaßen das sensible Porträt einer jungen Frau und ein Zeugnis der erstaunlichen und ermutigenden Veränderungen im heutigen Irland. In einer ehrlichen und präzisen Prosa ist Annas Lied ein bewegender Roman, der triumphierend und voller Freude in seiner eigenen besonderen Musik endet.«  
Brian Moore, Autor des Romans »Die Frau des Zauberers«